Manga Bookshelf

Discussion, Resources, Roundtables, & Reviews

Katherine Dacey

What Belongs in the Manga Canon?

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Back in 2006, I stumbled across this entry at Otaku Champloo, reflecting on the need for a manga “canon.” The author noted that books in the Western literary canon (e.g. Aeschylus, Dante, Shakespeare) were not the “most popular” titles, but titles that “reflect[ed] the progress of humanity” from classical antiquity to the machine age. She then posed several intriguing questions:

[W]hat really struck my head was the idea of a canon for manga. Could we come up a list of mangas that would best represent humanity and the manga genre? Another interesting question would be… what good would a manga canon bring? Does the world of manga need one?

When I first responded to her essay back in 2006, I hadn’t read very much manga — just enough to be dangerously opinionated and scornful of shojo* — and my knowledge of “classic” titles was limited to a few works by Osamu Tezuka and Kazuo Koike. I thought it would be an interesting challenge to revisit and revise that initial response to reflect where I am now, three years and hundreds of series later.

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What Belongs in the Manga Canon?

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Back in 2006, I stumbled across this entry at Otaku Champloo, reflecting on the need for a manga “canon.” The author noted that books in the Western literary canon (e.g. Aeschylus, Dante, Shakespeare) were not the “most popular” titles, but titles that “reflect[ed] the progress of humanity” from classical antiquity to the machine age. She then posed several intriguing questions:

[W]hat really struck my head was the idea of a canon for manga. Could we come up a list of mangas that would best represent humanity and the manga genre? Another interesting question would be… what good would a manga canon bring? Does the world of manga need one?

When I first responded to her essay back in 2006, I hadn’t read very much manga — just enough to be dangerously opinionated and scornful of shojo* — and my knowledge of “classic” titles was limited to a few works by Osamu Tezuka and Kazuo Koike. I thought it would be an interesting challenge to revisit and revise that initial response to reflect where I am now, three years and hundreds of series later.

TO INCLUDE OR NOT TO INCLUDE, THAT IS THE QUESTION

As I noted in my initial response, I used to teach at a university that organizes its undergraduate curriculum around the idea that certain works of art, literature, music, and philosophy represent the acme of Western civilization. You might think that the list of canonic works would be fixed, but in fact, the canon is constantly evolving. When the university first mandated its “great works” curriculum in the 1920s, for example, Mary Wollenstonecraft didn’t make the cut; only with the rise of feminist scholarship in the 1970s was her groundbreaking Vindication of the Rights of Woman added to the canon. The 1980s prompted a similar round of revisions to the curriculum: realizing that its emphasis on Western culture excluded some of the oldest and most influential literature in the world, the university developed courses about the canonic work of Eastern civilizations: The Art of War, The Tale of Genji, The Shahnameh.

I cite these curriculum changes because they remind us that defining a canon is a tricky business. There’s a veritable cottage industry of think-tanks and self-appointed cultural guardians who view the inclusion of new voices as a threat to the integrity of the literary canon, as if the recognition that women and blacks have written important books might undermine the point of the whole exercise. (They generally fuss less about Great Art and Great Music, though more conservative scholars in those fields police these canons with a similar zeal: Clara Schumann, hit the road!) In their eyes, the canon is a super-exclusive night club open only to a few “universally” recognized authors; they reject the notion that scholars might have valid historical reasons for admitting a few more folks past the velvet rope.

Then there’s that pesky issue of relevance. My students were always shocked that our music survey didn’t include familiar composers like Tchaikovsky: if we were still performing The Nutcracker and Swan Lake, why wasn’t he taking his rightful place alongside Hildegaard of Bingen and Anton Webern, two composers that 98% of them had never heard of before taking my class? As a music historian, I could rebut their arguments, but my students had a point: sometimes we become so obsessed with the idea that a canon represents the best, most timeless products of a culture that we forget the extent to which taste and connoisseurship play a role in deciding what to include — and what to exclude. (Poor old Tchaikovsky is just too tacky for some scholars, I guess.) We ignore that distinction at our own peril, however, as a canon can become a self-perpetuating list impervious to criticism or revision. Anyone intent on making a list of manga masterpieces, therefore, should bear in mind these observations about how and why we create canons — observations drawn from own experiences studying one of the most canon-centric fields, music.

First, historians play a major role in deciding what works make the cut. This is what I call the “Bach” rule: by the time J. S. Bach was writing his best-known works, his style was seen as old-fashioned, even a little stodgy, and not something an up-and-coming composer would want to emulate. Yet 250 years later, Bach is a household name. Why? Because Bach was “discovered” in the nineteenth century by prominent historians and composers who admired the rigor of his counterpoint and the beauty of his compositions. As a result, he became one of the most studied and posthumously influential composers in Western history. I say this not to slight Bach, or to perpetuate Romantic notions of genius (“they only appreciate you after you’re dead!”), but to remind any would-be canon-builders that an artist’s role in advancing the medium is often the most important rationalization for including his work in a canon.

Second, scholars tend to be suspicious of artists whose work is genuinely popular. This is what I call the “Rachmaninoff” rule: audiences may flock to performances of the Second Piano Concerto, but the canon’s gate-keepers treat Rachmaninoff as “just” a tunesmith whose crowd-pleasing melodies lack the harmonic or structural sophistication of Stravinsky and Wagner’s best work. Rachmaninoff’s tenuous membership in the canon reflects our lingering skepticism about popularity: if everyone likes Rachmaninoff’s music, could it really as worthy of study and emulation as music that aspires to greater levels of compositional complexity (e.g. The Rite of Spring, Parsifal)? It’s the same impulse that might lead a manga scholar to include Tezuka’s Buddha in the canon while excluding Kishimoto’s Naruto or Takahashi’s Ranma 1/2 — we wouldn’t want the “merely” popular taking its place alongside bonafide masterpieces, would we?

Third, there is no such thing as a “universal” canon. This is what I call the “Gershwin” rule. From the perspective of an American historian, George Gershwin is a canonic composer, profoundly influencing the development of American music with his distinctive marriage of black vernacular styles to European art forms. But from a Russian or Italian perspective, Gershwin is a local anomaly, a decent American composer who enjoys a far greater reputation among his fellow countrymen than in the international community. (Translation: he ain’t no Stravinsky or Verdi.) As such, Gershwin is less likely to be mentioned by an Italian musicologist in the same breath as Rossini, Verdi, or Beethoven. Undoubtedly, there will be artists whose importance to Americans may make them obvious candidates for inclusion in a manga canon, but who may not be viewed as favorably on the other side of the Pacific (and vice versa, I might add).

Finally, there is no such thing as an opera or a novel or a manga that is timeless. This is what I call the “Don Giovanni” rule: we still perform Mozart’s opera 200+ years after its initial premiere, but our experience of Don Giovanni is utterly different than that of audiences who heard it 1787. Most of the opera’s musical “in jokes,” for example, are lost on us—how many of us would recognize Mozart’s shout-out to fellow composer Martin y Soler? And how many of us would grasp the subtle musical gestures that Mozart uses to indicate his characters’ social status—gestures that were old hat to his audience? It’s a safe bet that Osamu Tezuka’s current audience experiences his work differently than its original readers, even though we may admire some of the same qualities in his work as the first generation of Princess Knight and Astro Boy fans.

Is there a need for a similar “canon” of manga masterpieces? The growing body of literature on influential artists such as Osamu Tezuka suggests that scholars already entertain some notion of a manga canon. As we begin labeling works “masterpieces,” however, we need to be mindful of the way in which these labels can trap us, preventing us from critiquing or questioning, say, Tatsumi or Tezuka’s greatness. We also need to remember that whatever canon we devise will be flawed from the outset, revised many times, and say as much about our own tastes and values as it will about the inherent quality or relevance of the manga it includes.

POSTSCRIPT

Having identified several potential pitfalls of canonization (if I might re-purpose that term for non-Vatican usage), I’m curious to know (a) whether it makes sense to talk about a manga “canon” and (b) what titles and authors you think belong in the canon. I’m particularly interested in the issue of gender: what female manga-ka belong in a canon and why? Do we have an innate bias towards seinen works, to the exclusion of shojo and josei titles? Inquiring minds want to know!

UPDATE, 9/15/09: Over at Extremely Graphic, librarian-blogger Sadie Maddox offers a thoughtful response to the question of whether or not Americans even have any business talking about a “manga canon.” She notes:

By being translated the integrity of the original work is compromised.  Of course, I’m all for translating because it means I get to read manga and I know that most translators do an excellent job.  But still, that’s one layer removed from the original intent. Are Americans really the ones who should be making a canon out of completely foreign material?

I didn’t get into the issue of translation (obviously one that would need to be addressed, if we were going to take this exercise to its logical conclusion), so go, read, and join the discussion at Extremely Graphic.

UPDATE, 10/6/09: Scholars John E. Ingulsrud and Kate Allen, authors of Reading Japan Cool: Patterns of Manga Literacy and Discourse, posted an interesting response to the question, “What belongs in the manga canon?” Their argument hinges on pedagogy: they note the original purpose of a canon was “to teach and test,” citing the New Testament as a body of literature compiled, in part, to answer the question, “Who was Jesus?” They suggest that any manga canon will arise from a similar need to teach and test. I think that’s a valid argument for the Japanese academy, but is more problematic in a Western context; it’s simply too early to know whether manga will be a permanent part of the American cultural landscape or just a passing fad. I also think they’re too quick to dismiss the question of artistry, as one of the most important contemporary functions of the so-called Western canon — by which I mean literature, art, and music — is to teach aesthetics. Whatever my philosophical differences with Ingulrud and Allen, I found their historical arguments compelling, and encourage you to read their essay for a different perspective on the issue of canonicity.

* I got over it, so don’t paint me as a shojo-hater. Anytime someone wants to license The Windows of Orpheus or The Poe Family, I’ll be a very happy camper.

Where to Buy Manga: Comicopia (Boston, MA)

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IMG_0080Highbrow, lowbrow… and everything in between. That’s the slogan of Comicopia, a Mecca (mecha?) for Beantown manga lovers. For twenty years, this modest Kenmore Square storefront has been catering to discerning comic fans of all persuasions, stocking everything from Introducing Derrida to Mr. Arashi’s Amazing Freak Show, as well as crowd-pleasers like Peanuts, Bone, Y: The Last Man, Justice Society of America, and, of course, Bleach, Naruto and Fruits Basket. Comicopia’s low-key, friendly vibe is more bookstore than comic store, making it a great place for former Barnes & Noble junkies to ween themselves off the chain store habit.

Owner Matt Lehman claims to have “New England’s largest selection of manga,” a claim substantiated by both the quantity and variety of titles on Comicopia’s shelves. On my most recent visit, for example, I found all nineteen volumes of Full Metal Alchemist alongside full runs of Dragon Head, Eden: It’s An Endless World, and Swan, as well as a generous assortment of older and more obscure titles: Junko Mizuno’s Cinderalla, Shirow Masamune’s Black Magic, Junjo Ito’s Museum of Terror, numerous volumes of Basara, and the first volume of The Monkey King. “We’re committed to carrying every manga in print,” Lehman explains. “We make an effort to stock the first two or three volumes of each new series as it comes out, and continue carrying what sells.”

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Jyu-Oh-Sei, Vols. 1-3

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9781427810151In the year 2346 A.D., humans have colonized the Vulcan solar system, a region so inhospitable that the average life span is a mere thirty years. Rai and Thor, whose parents belong to Vulcan’s ruling elite, enjoy a life of rare privilege — that is, until a political rival executes their parents and exiles the boys to Kimaera, a penal colony reserved for violent criminals. To say Kimaera’s climate is harsh understates the case: daylight lasts for 181 days, producing extreme desert conditions and water shortages, while nighttime plunges Kimaera into arctic darkness for an equal length of time. Making the place even more treacherous is the flora, as Kimaera’s jungles team with carnivorous plants capable of eating humans whole.

On the planet’s surface, Rai and Thor discover a tribal society based on physical strength and skin color. Four tribes, or “rings,” as they’re known, provide their members food and protection from the extreme climate, but there’s a catch: each person must prove himself strong enough to defend the ring from encroachment by rival factions. The strife within rings is mirrored in the uneasy relationship among the tribal leaders, a motley assortment of criminals, ex-military men, and native Kimaeran women. The ring leaders compete to become the Beast King, Kimaera’s official representative in the Vulcan government and the only person allowed to leave the planet’s surface.

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Jyu-Oh-Sei, Vols. 1-3

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In the year 2346 A.D., humans have colonized the Vulcan solar system, a region so inhospitable that the average life span is a mere thirty years. Rai and Thor, whose parents belong to Vulcan’s ruling elite, enjoy a life of rare privilege — that is, until a political rival executes their parents and exiles the boys to Kimaera, a penal colony reserved for violent criminals. To say Kimaera’s climate is harsh understates the case: daylight lasts for 181 days, producing extreme desert conditions and water shortages, while nighttime plunges Kimaera into arctic darkness for an equal length of time. Making the place even more treacherous is the flora, as Kimaera’s jungles team with carnivorous plants capable of eating men whole.

On the planet’s surface, Rai and Thor discover a tribal society based on physical strength and skin color. Four tribes, or “rings,” as they’re known, provide their members food and protection from the extreme climate, but there’s a catch: each person must prove himself strong enough to defend the ring from encroachment by rival factions. The strife within rings is mirrored in the uneasy relationship among the tribal leaders, a motley assortment of criminals, ex-military men, and native Kimaeran women. The ring leaders compete to become the Beast King, Kimaera’s official representative in the Vulcan government and the only person allowed to leave the planet’s surface.

Sensing an opportunity to upset the uneasy truce that exists among the Blanc, Noir, Ochre, and Sun Rings, several unscrupulous figures encourage Thor to fight his way up the ranks to become the Beast King — his best (and perhaps only) opportunity for escaping Kimaera and finding out why his parents were murdered. Aiding him is Tiz, a tough, resourceful Kimaeran girl who wants Thor for a mate. (In a nice change of pace, women choose their partners, a request men can’t decline.)

Natsumi Itsuki does a superb job of world-building in volume one, striking the right balance between exposition and action. The plot twists come fast and furious, but they feel like a natural outgrowth of the situations the characters find themselves in, rather than an arbitrary decision to move the story in a particular direction. Only in the third and final volume do things begin to fall apart; the first hundred pages are filled with talking heads explaining Kimaera’s true purpose (hint: it involves evil scientists), revealing Thor’s identity, and waxing philosophic about whether mankind should be allowed to become extinct. Perhaps sensing that the story was beginning to sag under the weight of its own pretentiousness, Itsuki then stages a lengthy, exciting battle that pits Thor against those infamous, man-eating plants and a super-computer of HAL-like malevolence.

9781427810168-1Though the story is well-executed, the artwork is something of a disappointment. Itsuki goes to great pains to create a diverse cast — a task at which she’s generally successful — but her character designs are generic and dated; I’d be hard-pressed to distinguish the Kimaerans from, say, the cast of RG Veda or Basara. Itsuki also struggles with skin color; her dark-skinned women bear an unfortunate resemblance to kogals, thanks to Itsuki’s clumsy application of screentone.

More disappointing are Itsuki’s fight scenes: they register as scratchy messes, thanks to her over-reliance on speedlines and trapezoidal panels. The third volume, for example, consists of several lengthy scenes of hand-to-hand combat in which all of the action is suggested by superimposing horizontal lines on close-ups of contorted faces; we never get a clear sense of where the characters are standing in relation to one another, nor do we always have a clear sense of where the action is unfolding.

Tokyopop has done a good job of presenting Jyu-Oh-Sei. The manga was originally released in five volumes; Tokyopop wisely repackaged the story in omnibus format to allow Jyu-Oh-Sei‘s lengthy and complicated story arcs to unfold without significant interruption. The translation is clear and idiomatic, even when the characters are called upon to speak in unadulterated Science Fiction. The only downside to Tokyopop’s presentation is the paperstock: as many readers have observed, it’s thin and greyish, like newsprint, and allows images to bleed through the page.

Aside from a third-act detour into sci-fi pomposity, Jyu-Oh-Sei is a solid, entertaining read: think B-movie in manga form. Like Invasion of the Body Snatchers and District 9, Jyu-Oh-Sei addresses social taboos — race, gender roles — and scientific issues — genetic engineering, environmental devastation — while serving up generous portions of what audiences crave: action, romance, monsters, explosions. Best of all, Jyu-Oh-Sei comes in a neat, three-volume package that’s long enough to allow for world-building and character development but short enough to stay fresh and surprising until the end. It’s the perfect summer escape, minus the sticky floors, endless previews, and seven dollar buckets of popcorn.

This review is an expanded version of an earlier review posted at PopCultureShock. My original review of volume one can be found here.

Review copy of volume one provided by Tokyopop.

JYU-OH-SEI, VOLS. 1-3 • BY NATSUMI ITSUKI • TOKYOPOP • RATING: TEEN

Tegami Bachi: Letter Bee, Vol. 1

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tegami_coverTegami Bachi has all the right ingredients to be a great shonen series: a dark, futuristic setting; rad monsters; cool weapons powered by mysterious energy sources; characters with goofy names (how’s “Gauche Suede” grab you?); and smart, stylish artwork. Unfortunately, volume one seems a little underdone, like a piping-hot shepherd’s pie filled with rock-hard carrots.

The problem lies with the story: manga-ka Hiroyuki Asada takes a simple premise and gussies it up with fussy, poorly explained details. The story itself may remind readers of Banya the Explosive Delivery Man or The Postman, as Tegami Bachi‘s principal characters are also mail carriers — or, in the series’ parlance, Letter Bees — who traverse dark wastelands to deliver letters and packages to the far-flung residents of their homeworld. In the case of Tegami Bachi, that homeworld is Amberground, a planet illuminated by a single, man-made star that hovers above its capital city, Akatsuki, where the wealthiest, most powerful citizens live. Amberground’s cities are separated by country inhabited only by Gaichuu, giant insects whose metal exoskeletons are impervious to most weapons, save the shindanjuu, or heart gun, the preferred sidearm of Letter Bees.

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Tegami Bachi: Letter Bee, Vol. 1

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Tegami Bachi has all the right ingredients to be a great shonen series: a dark, futuristic setting; rad monsters; cool weapons powered by mysterious energy sources; characters with goofy names (how’s “Gauche Suede” grab you?); and smart, stylish artwork. Unfortunately, volume one seems a little underdone, like a piping-hot shepherd’s pie filled with rock-hard carrots.

The problem lies with the story: manga-ka Hiroyuki Asada takes a simple premise and gussies it up with fussy, poorly explained details. The story itself may remind readers of Banya the Explosive Delivery Man or The Postman, as Tegami Bachi‘s principal characters are also mail carriers — or, in the series’ parlance, Letter Bees — who traverse dark wastelands to deliver letters and packages to the far-flung residents of their homeworld. In the case of Tegami Bachi, that homeworld is Amberground, a planet illuminated by a single, man-made star that hovers above its capital city, Akatsuki, where the wealthiest, most powerful citizens live. Amberground’s cities are separated by country inhabited only by Gaichuu, giant insects whose metal exoskeletons are impervious to most weapons, save the shindanjuu, or heart gun, the preferred sidearm of Letter Bees.

How, exactly, the shindanjuu works is never satisfactorily explained, despite its prominent role in the story. I had to consult the appendix, which defines “heart” as a magical, omnipresent energy that penetrates and surrounds most living beings, not unlike The Force. (The Gaichuu, lacking heart, are vulnerable to its awesome power, especially when it takes the form of hollow bullets). The shindanjuu also enables Letter Bees to experience other people’s memories in a vivid, almost hallucinatory fashion. As with the magic bullets, the gun’s dream-sharing capacity gets only a cursory explanation; the dream sequences are hella confusing, requiring several readings to figure out whose memories we’re seeing.

Tegami Bachi‘s other shortcoming is its two principal characters. Gauche Suede, the older, more experienced Letter Bee, is a stock shonen hero: a confident, tough-talking loner who turns out to be a softie under his cool, competent exterior. Lag Seeing, the younger one, begins his journey as a package — he’s one of Gauche’s deliveries — and decides to become a Letter Bee after Gauche safely guides them through Gaichuu-infested territory. Lag, too, is a familiar type, the slightly dim but very sincere Kid on a Mission who views mail delivery as his true calling. Both characters have sad back stories involving female relatives — again, a standard shonen trope that does little to enrich the story.

The artwork, on the other hand, is genuinely striking; Tegami Bachi is one of the best-looking titles in the Shonen Jump catalog. Hiroyuki Asada’s landscapes are beautifully rendered, giving a clear sense of Amberground’s geography, technology (they’re in the nineteenth-century Bavarian phase of development, to judge from the architecture), fauna, and flora. And man, what flora! In one amusing sequence, Lag fights Gaichuu in a forest of giant broccoli. Does make you wonder, though: how do those florets get so big without sunlight?

Asada makes effective use of screentone to capture Amberground’s perpetual night, reserving true black for the sky and for a few important details: Gauche’s jacket, the Gaichuu’s carapaces. He incorporates star imagery into almost every scene without it ever seeming cheesy or heavy-handed; the stars have symbolic importance, to be sure, but they also serve an artistic purpose, bringing light and contrast to a layout that might otherwise be a murky mess.

If I seem unduly harsh in my assessment of Tegami Bachi, it’s only because it has the potential to be good — really good, if Asada focuses more on character development and less on mystical hoo-ha. The premise lends itself to both a Delivery of the Week format, in which each chapter functions as a stand-alone story, and to a more traditional Boy on a Quest narrative, in which Gauche, Lag, or both set out to rescue the people they love. Either way, I’ll be picking up volume two to see if the storytelling rises to the level of the artwork.

Review copy provided by VIZ Media, LLC. Volume one will be available on September 1, 2009.

TEGAMI BACHI, VOL. 1 • BY HIROYUKI ASADA • VIZ • 200 pp. • RATING: TEEN

Children of the Sea, Vol. 1

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cots1The ocean occupies a special place in the artistic imagination, inspiring a mixture of awe, terror, and fascination. Watson and the Shark, for example, depicts the ocean as the mouth of Hell, a dark void filled with demons and tormented souls, while The Birth of Venus offers a more benign vision of the ocean as a life-giving force. In Children of the Sea, Daisuke Igarashi imagines the ocean as a giant portal between the terrestrial world and deep space, as is suggested by a refrain that echoes throughout volume one:

From the star.
From the stars.
The sea is the mother.
The people are the breasts
Heaven is the playground.

How, exactly, sea and sky are connected is the central mystery of Children of the Sea. The story begins in the present day, as a woman promises to tell her son “about a giant shark that lives deep beneath the waves,” “the ghosts that cross the sea,” and “the path that connects the sea to space.” We then jump back to a defining moment in Ruka’s childhood when, on a visit to the local aquarium, she saw a fish disappear in a bright flash of light – what she describes as “a ghost in the water.” Ruka doesn’t think much of the incident until she meets Umi and Sora, two humans whose bodies are better adapted to life in the ocean than on land. Under the watchful eye of her father and his assistant Jim, the boys live at the aquarium, venturing out into daylight only to visit the hospital and swim in the open ocean. Eager to know more about Umi and Sora, Ruka sets out to sea with them, where she watches the boys swim with a second “ghost in the water”: a luminescent whale shark that leaves a starry wake in its trail.

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Children of the Sea, Vol. 1

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The ocean occupies a special place in the artistic imagination, inspiring a mixture of awe, terror, and fascination. Watson and the Shark, for example, depicts the ocean as the mouth of Hell, a dark void filled with demons and tormented souls, while The Birth of Venus offers a more benign vision of the ocean as a life-giving force. In Children of the Sea, Daisuke Igarashi imagines the ocean as a giant portal between the terrestrial world and deep space, as is suggested by a refrain that echoes throughout volume one:

From the star.
From the stars.
The sea is the mother.
The people are the breasts
Heaven is the playground.

How, exactly, sea and sky are connected is the central mystery of Children of the Sea. The story begins in the present day, as a woman promises to tell her son “about a giant shark that lives deep beneath the waves,” “the ghosts that cross the sea,” and “the path that connects the sea to space.” We then jump back to a defining moment in Ruka’s childhood when, on a visit to the local aquarium, she saw a fish disappear in a bright flash of light – what she describes as “a ghost in the water.” Ruka doesn’t think much of the incident until she meets Umi and Sora, two humans whose bodies are better adapted to life in the ocean than on land. Under the watchful eye of her father and his assistant Jim, the boys live at the aquarium, venturing out into daylight only to visit the hospital and swim in the open ocean. Eager to know more about Umi and Sora, Ruka sets out to sea with them, where she watches the boys swim with a second “ghost in the water”: a luminescent whale shark that leaves a starry wake in its trail.

As Ruka struggles to understand Umi and Sora’s connection to the shark, she begins to realize that a profound change is taking place at sea. Thousands of common fish are disappearing from aquariums around the world; rarely seen deep-water species are washing ashore on Japanese beaches; and dugongs are visiting waters normally too cold for such tropical creatures. What these events mean is not yet clear, though they all seem like manifestations of the same phenomenon.

ruka1

Daisuke Igarashi is a masterful storyteller, liberally mixing genres – the coming-of-age story, the scientific mystery – to create a unique drama that’s eerie and compelling. As fanciful as the story’s details may be, Children of the Sea maintains a firm grip on reality, thanks to its memorable, true-to-life characters. Ruka, in particular, is a fine creation, a strong, independent girl who reacts with her fists instead of her mouth, has trouble making friends, and burns with curiosity about the things she’s seen. Umi and Sora, too, both have distinctive personalities; whatever their role in the story’s eventual denouement, neither are portrayed as innocents or naifs but as smart, worldly, and sometimes prickly individuals who are in a desperate race against time.

Igarashi’s expert storytelling is beautifully complemented by his artwork. He favors a naturalistic style, rendering every element of the layout in his own hand rather than relying on tracings or prefabricated backgrounds. As a result, his pages are visually complex but thoroughly organic; every element of the design feels essential to establishing the story’s location in space and time. His characters are realistic, though their proportions are slightly awkward. Their large heads and big hands make them seem otherworldly and fragile, especially when contrasted with the large, powerful animals they encounter at sea.

If you’re not yet sold on Children of the Sea, I strongly encourage you to visit Viz’s IKKI website, where all eight chapters of volume one are available for free online browsing. Be warned, however, that this poetic, graceful, and thought-provoking story may cast a spell on you, too, making you reflect on the truth of Jacques Cousteau’s comment that “The sea, the great unifier, is man’s only hope. Now, as never before, the old phrase has a literal meaning: we are all in the same boat.”

Review copy provided by VIZ Media, LLC.

CHILDREN OF THE SEA, VOL. 1 • BY DAISUKE IGARASHI • VIZ • 320 pp. • RATING: OLDER TEEN (16+)

Dororo, Vols. 1-3

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dororo1If Phoenix is Tezuka’s Ring Cycle, Wagnerian in scope, form, and seriousness, then Dororo is Tezuka’s Don Giovanni, a playful marriage of supernatural intrigue and lowbrow comedy whose deeper message is cloaked in shout-outs to fellow artists (in this case, Shunji Sonoyama instead of Vicente Martin y Soler), self-referential jokes, pop-culture allusions, fourth-wall humor, and a bestiary of bodacious demons.

Its hero, Hyakkimaru, is born under a black cloud, thanks to a deal his father, Lord Daigo, struck with forty-eight devils: in exchange for political and military power, Daigo allowed each demon to claim one of his unborn child’s body parts. After his son’s birth, Daigo places Hyakkimaru in a basket and, against his wife’s wishes, sets the baby adrift on a river. A kind doctor rescues and raises Hyakkimaru, eventually building him a new body that transformed the legless, armless boy into a fighting machine equipped with an exploding nose and sword prostheses. It doesn’t take long, however, before Daigo’s minions begin attacking Hyakkimaru and menacing Dr. Honma. In an effort to spare his mentor’s life, Hyakkimaru bids farewell to Dr. Honma and embarks on a quest to reclaim his body from the demons who aided Lord Daigo.

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Dororo, Vols. 1-3

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If Phoenix is Tezuka’s Ring Cycle, Wagnerian in scope, form, and seriousness, then Dororo is Tezuka’s Don Giovanni, a playful marriage of supernatural intrigue and lowbrow comedy whose deeper message is cloaked in shout-outs to fellow artists (in this case, Shunji Sonoyama instead of Vicente Martin y Soler), self-referential jokes, pop-culture allusions, fourth-wall humor, and a bestiary of bodacious demons.

Its hero, Hyakkimaru, is born under a black cloud, thanks to a deal his father, Lord Daigo, struck with forty-eight devils: in exchange for political and military power, Daigo allowed each demon to claim one of his unborn child’s body parts. After his son’s birth, Daigo places Hyakkimaru in a basket and, against his wife’s wishes, sets the baby adrift on a river. A kind doctor rescues and raises Hyakkimaru, eventually building him a new body that transformed the legless, armless boy into a fighting machine equipped with an exploding nose and sword prostheses. It doesn’t take long, however, before Daigo’s minions begin attacking Hyakkimaru and menacing Dr. Honma. In an effort to spare his mentor’s life, Hyakkimaru bids farewell to Dr. Honma and embarks on a quest to reclaim his body from the demons who aided Lord Daigo.

Hyakkimaru soon acquires a traveling companion: Dororo, a pint-sized pickpocket with a big mouth and a bad attitude. Despite Hyakkimaru’s efforts to rid himself of Dororo, the kid bandit vows not to leave Hyakkimaru’s side until he gets his hands on one of Hyakkimaru’s swords. The two wander a war-torn landscape, stumbling across fire-ravaged temples, starving villages, bandits, profiteers, homeless children… and demons. Lots of them.

dororo2Though much of the devastation that Hyakkimaru and Dororo witness is man-made (Dororo takes placed during the Sengoku, or Warring States, Period), demons exploit the conflict for their own benefit, holding small communities in their thrall, luring desperate travelers to their doom, and feasting on the never-ending supply of human corpses. Some of these demons have obvious antecedents in Japanese folklore — a nine-tailed kitsune — while others seem to have sprung full-blown from Tezuka’s imagination — a shark who paralyzes his victims with sake breath, a demonic toad, a patch of mold possessed by an evil spirit. (As someone who’s lived in prewar buildings, I can vouch for the existence of demonic mold. Lysol is generally more effective than swordplay in eliminating it, however.) Hyakkimaru has a vested interest in killing these demons, as he spontaneously regenerates a lost body part with each monster he slays. But he also feels a strong sense of kinship with many victims — a feeling not shared by those he helps, who cast him out of their village as soon as the local demon has been vanquished.

dororo3For folks who find the cartoonish aspects of Tezuka’s style difficult to reconcile with the serious themes addressed in Buddha, Phoenix, and Ode to Kirihito, Dororo may prove a more satisfying read. The cuteness of Tezuka’s heroes actually works to his advantage; they seem terribly vulnerable when contrasted with the grotesque demons, ruthless samurai, and scheming bandits they encounter. Tezuka’s jokes — which can be intrusive in other stories — also prove essential to Dororo‘s success. He shatters the fourth wall, inserts characters from his stable of “stars,” borrows characters from other manga-kas’ work, and punctuates moments of high drama with low comedy, underscoring the sheer absurdity of his conceits… like sake-breathing shark demons. Put another way, Dororo wears its allegory lightly, focusing primarily on swordfights, monster lairs, and damsels in distress while using its historical setting to make a few modest points about the corrosive influence of greed, power, and fear.

If I had any criticism of Dororo, it’s that the story ends too abruptly. Neither hero has reached the end of his journey, yet neither seems firmly resolved to continue his quest; they simply part ways at Hyakkimaru’s suggestion. I’m guessing that Tezuka was avoiding the obvious, sentimental conclusion suggested by a major revelation in volume three, but even that would have been better than slamming on the brakes at an arbitrary point in the narrative.

Weak ending notwithstanding, Dororo is one of Tezuka’s most accessible series, free of the historical and cultural baggage that can be an obstacle to enjoying his more ambitious, adult stories. If you haven’t yet explored Tezuka’s work, have found titles like Apollo’s Song too fraught for your tastes, or are wondering why this somewhat corny, boy-versus-monster manga beat out critical favorites like Monster and solanin in this year’s Eisner race, Dororo makes a perfect (re)introduction to Tezuka’s unique storytelling style. Highly recommended.

This review is based on complimentary copies provided by Vertical, Inc. for the purposes of a review. I have not received any form of compensation from Vertical, Inc. in exchange for publishing my opinion of this book.

DORORO, VOLS. 1-3 • BY OSAMU TEZUKA • VERTICAL, INC. • NO RATING

Short Takes: Black Bird, The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, and Ludwig II

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This week’s Short Takes column focuses on three very different comics. The first, Black Bird (VIZ), is a supernatural tale about a young girl whose flesh is as prized among demons as Kobe beef is among salarymen. The second, The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (Bandai Entertainment), is a one-volume adaptation of the 2006 film (which, in turn, is an “update” on the 1976 novel of the same name). And the third is Ludwig II (June Manga/DMP), an overripe costume drama about Wagner’s most famous sponsor, Mad King Ludwig of Bavaria.

BLACK BIRD, VOL. 1

BY KANOKO SAKURAKOJI • VIZ • 196 pp. • RATING: OLDER TEEN (16+)

blackbird1Since childhood, Misao has been cursed with an unlucky gift: the ability to see ghosts and demons. As her sixteenth birthday approaches, however, Misao’s luck begins to change. Isayama, the star of the tennis team, asks her out, and Kyo, a childhood friend, moves into the house next door, pledging to protect Misao from harm. Kyo’s promise is quickly put to the test when Isayama turns out to be a blood-thirsty demon who’s intent on killing — and eating — Misao. Just before Isayama attacks Misao, he tells her that she’s “the bride of prophecy”: drink her blood, and a demon will gain strength; eat her flesh, and he’ll enjoy eternal youth; marry her, and his whole clan will flourish. Kyo rescues Misao, revealing, in the process, that he himself is a tengu (winged demon) who’s also jonesing for her blood. Kyo then offers her a choice: marry him or die. Actually, Kyo is less tactful than that, telling Misao, “You can be eaten, or you can sleep with me and become my bride.”

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Cat Paradise, Vol. 1

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catparadise_1When I was applying to college, my guidance counselor encouraged me to compose a list of amenities that my dream school would have — say, a first-class orchestra or a bucolic New England setting. It never occurred to me to add “pet-friendly dormitories” to that list, but reading Yuji Iwahara’s Cat Paradise makes me wish I’d been a little more imaginative in my thinking. The students at Matabi Academy, you see, are allowed to have cats in the dorms, a nice perk that has a rather sinister rationale: cats play a vital role in defending the school against Kaen, a powerful demon who’s been sealed beneath its library for a century.

Yumi Hayakawa, the series’ plucky heroine, is blissfully unaware of Kaen’s existence when she and her beloved pet Kansuke enroll at Matabi Academy. Within hours of their arrival, however, they find themselves face-to-face with a blood-thirsty demon who describes himself as “the right knee” of Kaen. (N.B. He’s a lot more badass than “right knee” might suggest, and has a coat of human skulls to prove it.) The ensuing battle reveals that the school’s six-member student council is, in fact, comprised of magically-enhanced warriors who fight in concert with their pets. Each Guardian has a different ability; some possess super-strength, while others transform their cats into powerful weapons. Though prophecy foretold only six “fighting pairs,” Yumi and Kansuke quickly discover that they, too, have similar powers that obligate them to fight alongside the Guardians. Iwahara hasn’t explained why the prophecy proved wrong — a cloudy crystal ball, perhaps? — but it’s a safe bet that Yumi and Kansuke will have a special role to play in the impending showdown with Kaen, who has yet to materialize.

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Cat Paradise, Vol. 1

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When I was applying to college, my guidance counselor encouraged me to make a list of amenities that my dream school would have — say, a first-class orchestra or a bucolic New England setting. It never occurred to me to add “pet-friendly dormitories” to that list, but reading Yuji Iwahara’s Cat Paradise makes me wish I’d been a little more imaginative in my thinking. The students at Matabi Academy, you see, are allowed to have cats in the dorms, a nice perk that has a rather sinister rationale: cats play a vital role in defending the school against Kaen, a powerful demon who’s been sealed beneath its library for a century.

Yumi Hayakawa, the series’ plucky heroine, is blissfully unaware of Kaen’s existence when she and her beloved pet Kansuke enroll at Matabi Academy. Within hours of their arrival, however, they find themselves face-to-face with a blood-thirsty demon who describes himself as “the right knee” of Kaen. (N.B. He’s a lot more badass than “right knee” might suggest, and has a coat of human skulls to prove it.) The ensuing battle reveals that the school’s six-member student council is, in fact, comprised of magically-enhanced warriors who fight in concert with their pets. Each Guardian has a different ability; some possess super-strength, while others transform their cats into powerful weapons. Though prophecy foretold only six “fighting pairs,” Yumi and Kansuke quickly discover that they, too, have similar powers that obligate them to fight alongside the Guardians. Iwahara hasn’t explained why the prophecy proved wrong — a cloudy crystal ball, perhaps? — but it’s a safe bet that Yumi and Kansuke will have a special role to play in the impending showdown with Kaen, who has yet to materialize.

Though the plot sounds like an amalgam of manga cliches, Cat Paradise proves fun and fresh, thanks to Iwahara’s rich imagination and wicked sense of humor. The Guardians’ powers are handled in a particularly droll fashion: each student’s ability is based on his best talent, whether that be great physical speed or the ability to make a mean dumpling. The scenes in which Yumi and the other Guardians unleash their powers are both hilarious and horrifying, as Iwahara pokes fun at fighting-pair manga (e.g. Loveless) while punctuating the action with scary, visceral images (e.g. the demon’s coat). Iwahara also milks the talking animal concept for all its humorous potential, giving each Guardian’s cat a distinctive voice. The jokes are predictable but amusing; Kansuke speaks for many cats when he voices disdain for sweaters.

At first glance, Iwahara’s artwork looks a lot like other manga-ka’s. His cast is filled with familiar types, from the bishonen who’s so pretty people mistake him for a girl to the steely female fighter who looks older and more worldly than her peers. Yet a closer inspection of Iwahara’s drawing reveals a much higher level of craftsmanship that his generic character designs might suggest; he’s a consummate draftsman, favoring intricate linework over screentone to create volume and depth. (Even his character designs are more distinctive than they initially appear, as each human’s face contains a subtle echo of his cat’s.) The story’s good-vs-evil theme is neatly underscored by Iwahara’s use of white spaces and bold, black patches to create strong visual contrast and menacing shadows.

I’d be the first to admit that Cat Paradise defies easy classification. Is it a parody? A horror story? A plea for greater human-cat understanding? Or just a goof on Iwahara’s part, as his afterword suggests? No matter. Iwahara demonstrates that he can make almost any story work, no matter how ridiculous the premise may be. The proof is in the pudding: you don’t need to have a special fondness for cats, manga about cats, or manga about teen demon fighters to enjoy Cat Paradise, just a good sense of humor and a good imagination.

CAT PARADISE, VOL. 1 • BY YUJI IWAHARA • YEN PRESS • 192 pp. • RATING: OLDER TEEN

Swallowing the Earth

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swallowingearthcoverNineteen sixty-eight was a critical year in Osamu Tezuka’s artistic development. Best known as the creator of Astro Boy, Jungle Emperor Leo, and Princess Knight, the public viewed Tezuka primarily as a children’s author. That assessment of Tezuka wasn’t entirely warranted; he had, in fact, made several forays into serious literature with adaptations of Manon Lescaut (1947), Faust (1950), and Crime and Punishment (1953). None of these works had made a lasting impression, however, so in 1968, as gekiga was gaining more traction with adult readers, Tezuka adopted a different tact, writing a dark, erotic story for Big Comic magazine: Swallowing the Earth.

Like MW (1976-78), which was also serialized in Big Comic, Swallowing the Earth is an overripe, overstuffed period piece that’s both entertaining and frustrating for modern readers. The basic plot is simple: seven beautiful young women seek to avenge the untimely death of their mother by wrecking havoc on the political, social, and economic systems that robbed Zephryus of her money and her home. The only thing standing in their way is Gohonmatsu, a perpetually drunken longshoreman who’s immune to their charms.

Tezuka’s presentation of the story, however, is anything but straightforward, as he employs flashbacks, subplots, and red herrings galore to sustain the reader’s interest. Some of these gambits are so ridiculous and nervy they work. Zephyrus’ daughters, for example, team up with a female scientist to produce Dermoid Z, a synthetic skin that can completely transform a person’s appearance. From a manga-ka’s standpoint, Dermoid Z is a brilliant device, as it allows him to plausibly conceal his characters’ identities from the reader and the other actors in the drama, giving him latitude to do just about anything.

Other gambits flat fall, as they rely on outdated notions of gender and race for their dramatic impact. When Dermoid Z arrives in the United States, for example, African-Americans begin buying white “skins” in vast quantities, donning them to commit crimes, enjoy privileges that had been denied them, and exact retribution on their oppressors. White retaliation is swift and brutal, plunging American cities into a race war that destroys the very fabric of society. Lacking a deep understanding of American history, or the underlying causes of the 1968 riots that erupted after Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated, Tezuka’s subplot feels like a crude attempt to be topical. He’s grasped the basic injustice of segregation, yet he never humanizes his black characters; they remain a violent, faceless mob throughout this unfortunate episode.

Tezuka’s treatment of women is likewise muddled. He clearly recognizes that men have treated women as property throughout human history, a point he illustrates both through Zephryus’ story (which unfolds in Nazi-occupied France) and through an interlude in the South Seas, where a tribal chief barters with Gohonmatsu for a downed airplane, offering his two daughters in exchange for the machine. Yet Tezuka’s own notions of female sexuality frequently undermine his critique of male privilege. He depicts Gohonmatsu’s South Seas brides as sexual grotesques, with bodies as roundly deformed as the Venus of Willendorf’s and libidos that verge on nymphomania. Women from the developed world don’t fare much better, as Tezuka neatly divides them into two camps: man-hating hysterics (e.g. Zephyrus’ daughters) and tormented victims (e.g. a beautiful aphasiac who lost her ability to speak after she was raped).

However dated Swallowing the Earth‘s racial and sexual politics may be, it’s hard to deny the sheer exuberance of Tezuka’s artwork. His imagination yields some stunning — and stunningly weird — images. Zephyrus’ palace, in particular, is a marvelous creation, an Art Deco ziggeraut filled with enormous cat statues that look like they were swiped from Cleopatra’s tomb. Tezuka frequently experiments with the layout, varying the shape of the panels to suit the pace and intensity of the action, or to suggest the simultaneity of two events. One of the best examples occurs early in the story, when Gohonmatsu duels a handsome Spanish count on the deck of a tugboat:

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Tezuka uses diagonal panels to mimic the rocking motion of a ship anchored in choppy water. The shape of the panels also demonstrate just how difficult it is for both characters to find their footing on the slippery deck — a small but tricky detail that isn’t easy to capture in a static image.

In an excellent companion essay to the English-language edition, manga scholar Frederick Schodt acknowledges Swallowing the Earth‘s myriad flaws — its surfeit of plotlines, its racial caricatures — while celebrating the almost anarchic way in which the story unfolds. He encourages readers to enjoy Earth as a “wild ride” and a window into a critical period in Tezuka’s development, showing us “how he began to make the transition from a children’s artist to someone who could push the manga medium in every genre, even for adult readers.” It’s in this spirit that I recommend Swallowing the Earth, as testament to Tezuka’s fertile imagination, and his ability to grow as an artist and a storyteller.

SWALLOWING THE EARTH • BY OSAMU TEZUKA • DMP • 516 pp. • RATING: OLDER TEEN (16+)